Published on: 2 September 2024
This update corrects remote violence interactions between IDF and Hezbollah recorded as Armed clashes to distinct Explosions/Remote violence events, creating a more accurate representation of the remote nature of the fighting between Hezbollah and IDF since 7 October 2023.
Impacted data: Armed clash events between Hezbollah and Military Forces of Israel in which both sides engage in remote violence (airstrikes, missiles, shelling) from 7 October 2023 to 29 August 2024.
Publication date: The first batch of data improvements were published 2 September 2024, covering the period from May 2024 to present.
Future batches of data improvements will be published over the next months and will be mentioned in this update log article. In the meantime, users should take into account that the subset defined under ‘impacted data’ from October 2023 to April 2024 will show a higher number of Armed clash events and fewer Explosions/Remote violence events.
Summary of changes:
“Armed clash” events between Hezbollah and IDF involving the use of remote violence, such as airstrikes, missiles or shelling by both sides are corrected to “Explosions/Remote violence” events. In addition, by parsing out the positions involved in the remote strikes, new distinct locations could be identified and the remote violence occuring there could be disaggregated and recorded as distinct events.
The first batch of updates, covering 1 May 2024 to 29 August 2024, resulted in 313 events corrected and 102 new events added through disaggregation.
Why are we changing this:
In ACLED’s general methodology, an Armed clash event is coded two armed groups engage in direct armed interactions using various weapons, including remote weapons such as airstrikes and shelling. These interactions need to be of a direct nature – units exchanging fire within the same battle. However, this directness is not present in a subset of clashes between IDF and Hezbollah in the wake of the 7 October 2023 attacks by Hamas. Reports indicate that strikes are conducted ‘in response’ and ‘in retaliation’ to earlier strikes by the other side. However, in many cases there is significant time delay between the strikes or the strike targets a general area under the opposing group’s control, but does not appear to engage the specific units that conducted the initial strike. As such, these interactions are more akin to both parties conducting distinct remote strikes against each other rather than engaging directly in an armed clash. With this update, the data more accurately represents the remote nature of the clashes between Hezbollah and IDF.
Further information:
Consult our Knowledge Base for more information on ACLED’s methodology around coding of armed clashes and remote violence. For more background and analysis, see our articles on Lebanon and Israel.
